For clarification of the project for the EFET (European Federation of Energy Traders) it is important to distinguish the following 3 terms:

EFET is a federation consisting of the major European Energy Traders which defines standards for energy trading

EFET net is a B2B integration project based on EFET standards

EFET Box is a software product based on the Ponton X technology implementing the EFET standards

The EFET Box
The EFET Box is used by European Energy Traders to exchange and match trade confirmations. The requirements for this were:

• Security and Reliability of communications (provided by using Ponton X/P technology)
• End-to-End-Integration between the trading-systems of traders and brokers
• Implementation of the eCM (electronic Confirmation Matching) standards
• Flexible integration with back-end interfaces of different trading systems. Ponton X/D is used for that purpose

Just as Ponton X/P, the EFET Box can be used on all operating systems and with all database systems so that an industry-wide feasibility is provided. The following is a screenshot of the web-based user interface of the EFET Box visualizing the information flow between traders and brokers:

Additional features of the EFET Box

Since 2004 the EFET Box has been continuously improved to meet the increasing needs of customers and the EFETnet standard.

Important aspects from the perspective of an Energy Trader's Back-Office:

• Automation for the bilateral matching of trade confirmations for the following products: electricity, gas, CO2 certificates
• Support for the following trade types: trades with and without broker, physical deals or physical options, peak, off-peak or custom load types
• Broker integration with verification of the brokerage fee
• Drastic reduction of manual effort (up to 70%) for trade confirmations
• Decrease of trading risks by automating manual cross-check processes
• Using Straight-Through-Processing trades are matched over the internet within seconds and the trading system receives feedback about the matching status
• Audit-trail information to ensure availability of complete communication history¶
• Comprehensive information about the matching status of all trades
• "Near-Match-Finder" provides search-support for suitable trades when automatic matching failed
• Direct "Peer-To-Peer" exchange without necessity for hubs or portals. Therefore higher security and no transaction-based cost or portal-provider fees
• Data export to Excel or PDF

As an IT professional I'd be interested in:

• Fast and easy back-end integration via hot-folder, web-service or database adapter (Ponton X/D) due to flexible interfaces
• Maximum security and reliability based on ebXML (Ponton X/P functionality) as the communications protocol
• Easy installation: The software can be installed and configured within 30 minutes
• E-mail notifications can be configured for error messages, warnings and other events such as time-outs for trade confirmations, mismatches etc.)
• Single-sign-on (SSO) using LDAP
• Fast integration with new trading partners due to the usage of Ponton X/P technology - across firewalls and certificate-based for secure data exchange
• Sophisticated data extraction using Ponton X/D